“I didn’t want to. There was no reason for me to,” Gooding Jr. told PEOPLE during the FX Winter TCA Press Tour on Saturday in Pasadena, California.

“If I was playing him today, I’d have to put on a lot of weight,” said Gooding Jr., who portrays the former NFL star during his

1994-95 trial

for the alleged murder of his ex-wife

Nicole Brown Simpson

and her friend

Ron Goldman

.

“I know what incarceration does to a man. I have friends and family who have been incarcerated. They click and they start to believe whatever it is that they believe as the real thing that happened to them.”

Gooding Jr., 48, adds he “didn’t want that in this performance.

“He wasn’t that. He was this flamboyant, charismatic, movie star, marquee-athlete. I needed that arrogance. That was where my focus was.”

MUSIC HEADLINES

Twenty two year old Calynn M. Lawrence is a hot shot girlboss with a career that packs quite a punch for someone who hasn’t even hit the other side of twenty-five. You can catch her on the red carpet, in the zone working long days and steep nights or on her social […]

Movies

Pretty awesome, right? Liu Yifei embodies the spirit of Mulan in that photo, balancing the strength, femininity, and intensity of the character. We still don’t know anything about her actual performance as the character in the movie, but this first-look is an enticing tease that (at the very...